an approximate start date. When did you first notice this impact? If the impact is no loger affecting you, please estimate when it stopped.

the location of the impact--what city/cities or county/counties are being affected? Don't forget to include the name of the state!

We welcome photos as well; please note the conditions specified in the "Images" section below.

* indicates required field

Description

Please provide a Description of how drought is affecting you, your livelihood, your activities, etc.If there is a report online that helps illustrate your observation, please use the Related Link box to provide the link. We encourage regular observations, rain or shine, related to some aspect of your environment or experience that is affected by drought. For more information, please read about Condition Monitoring Reports.Learn how your report becomes an impact.

Impact Description*Related Link

Categories

Please select at least one category that relates to the kind of drought impact that you are reporting. If none of these apply, please select General Awareness.

Agriculture

Business & Industry

Energy

Fire

Plants & Wildlife

Relief, Response & Restrictions

Society & Public Health

Tourism & Recreation

Water Supply & Quality

Duration

The Start Date and End Date can be approximate. A Start Date is required. It is OK to leave the End Date blank if the impact is ongoing or if you don’t know when it ended.Click on the calendar icon and then on a specific date to select a Start Date or End Date, or manually enter a date using MM/DD/YYYY format.

* Start Date

End Date

Affected Places

To select an entire state, click on the arrow to the right of the name of the state. The name of the state should appear in the Affected Places box above.To report on an impact in a specific location, first click on the name of the state where it is. The state should be highlighted, but should not appear in the Affected Places box. A list of counties in the state will appear. To select one or more counties, click on the arrow to the right of the name of one or more counties. The counties you selected will appear in the Affected Places box.To select a city, first click on the name of the state where it is. The state should be highlighted, but should not appear in the Affected Places box. Then begin typing the name of the city in the box at the top of the City column, and select the city you want when it appears by clicking on the arrow to the right of its name.To unselect a state, county or city, click on the x to the left of its name in the Affected Places field.Clicking on Add All States will do just that. It may be faster to add all and then unselect a few than to select a large number of states. Please use this option with caution.If all but a few counties in a state are affected, you can select all, which will highlight all of them, and then hold down the control key and click on the county names to unselect them, and then click add selected to make the ones still highlighted appear in the Affected Places box.

State

add all states

Alabama

Alaska

Arizona

Arkansas

California

Colorado

Connecticut

Delaware

District of Columbia

Florida

Georgia

Hawaii

Idaho

Illinois

Indiana

Iowa

Kansas

Kentucky

Louisiana

Maine

Maryland

Massachusetts

Michigan

Minnesota

Mississippi

Missouri

Montana

Nebraska

Nevada

New Hampshire

New Jersey

New Mexico

New York

North Carolina

North Dakota

Ohio

Oklahoma

Oregon

Pennsylvania

Rhode Island

South Carolina

South Dakota

Tennessee

Texas

Utah

Vermont

Virginia

Washington

West Virginia

Wisconsin

Wyoming

County

add selected

select all

City

Images

Browse to the Photo you would like to submit. Attach up to five gif/jpg/jpeg/png image files smaller than 10 MB.Please enter the photographer’s name and organization, if applicable, as it should appear in the Credit.Enter the Date the photo was taken.Enter the Location where the photo was taken.Please provide Caption information that helps people understand what effect of drought the photo shows. It may be helpful to submit before and after photos, if possible, so that people can contrast drought conditions with normal conditions.

By submitting images, you agree that the National Drought Mitigation Center may publish them in the Drought Impact Reporter, on NDMC websites, or via social media. You also agree that you are the photographer or that you have the photographer’s permission to submit the photo.

Photo

Credit

Date

Location

Caption

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Photo

Credit

Date

Location

Caption

add another image

Photo

Credit

Date

Location

Caption

add another image

Photo

Credit

Date

Location

Caption

add another image

Photo

Credit

Date

Location

Caption

Contact Information

Please provide your State and the nearest City.Please provide an Email address.

* State

* City

Begin typing in the window and select your city when it appears below. (Select state first)

Drought effects affecting non-agriculture and non-tourism businesses, such as lawn care businesses, sales of recreational vehicles or other recreational gear, and plant nurseries. Examples of drought-induced business impacts could include: reduction or loss of employees, change in sales or volume of business, variation in number of calls for service, early closure or late opening for the season, bankruptcy, permanent store closure, economic impacts.

Energy

Drought effects associated with power production, electricity rates, energy revenue, and purchase of alternate sources of energy. Examples include hydropower and non-hydropower production when affected by drought, electricity rates, revenue shortfalls and/or windfall profits, purchase of electricity when hydropower generation is down.

Fire

Drought effects contributing to forest, range, rural, or urban fires, fire danger, and burning restrictions. Examples of fire impacts include: Enactment/easing of burning restrictions, fireworks ban, increased fire risk, occurrence of fire (number of acres burned, number of wildfires compared to average, people displaced, etc.), increase in firefighting personnel, state of emergency during periods of high fire danger, closure of roads land due to fire occurrence or risk.

Plants & Wildlife

Drought effects associated with unmanaged plants and wildlife, fisheries, forests, and other fauna. Examples of drought-induced impacts on plants and wildlife include: loss of biodiversity of plants or wildlife; loss of trees from rural or urban landscapes, shelterbelts, or wooded conservation areas; reduction and degradation of fish and wildlife habitat; lack of feed and drinking water; greater mortality due to increased contact with agricultural producers, as animals seek food from farms and producers are less tolerant of the intrusion; disease; increased vulnerability to predation (from species concentrated near water); migration and concentration (loss of wildlife in some areas and too many wildlife in other areas); increased stress to endangered species; salinity levels affecting wildlife, wildlife encroaching into urban areas, loss of wetlands.

Drought effects associated with water supply and water quality. Examples of drought-induced water supply and quality impacts include: Dry wells, water restrictions, changes in water rates, easing of water restrictions, increase in requests for new well permits, changes in water use due to water restrictions, greater water demand, decrease in water allocation or allotments, installation or alteration of water pumps or water intakes, changes to allowable water contaminants, water line damage or repairs due to drought stress, drinking water turbidity, change in water color or odor, declaration of drought watches or warnings, mitigation activities.

To understand the impacts of drought on plants, animals and people, it is
very helpful to monitor conditions regularly, whether the weather is wet or dry.
That way we know how a drought year differs from a normal year, and we learn how
different plants and animals go into and come out of drought. Regular condition
monitoring can also help identify expected seasonal changes versus changes
caused by unseasonal wet or dry conditions. This type of monitoring can also
help us start to identify long-term or cumulative effects of drought.

It would be ideal if you decide to report on a single indicator at regular
intervals, such as every month or season. You can also include other information
in your report, but we’d really like to have a continuous set of observations
about a single indicator. It might be easiest to do ongoing reporting if it’s
something you can quantify, such as the height of corn, or the number of
customers at a water-related outfitter. If you have questions or would like to
organize a network of observers, please contact Kelly Helm Smith,
ksmith2@unl.edu, 402-472-3373.

Ideas for what to monitor the condition of fall into several categories,
sometimes more than one:

Plants & Wildlife

Height or density of natural vegetation, one particular plant or a patch

Presence or absence of a certain kind of plant, including invasive species

Landscape or garden plants, height, progression through growth cycles

Ex: Frequency of lawn mowing

Whether landscape or garden plants need watering

Brown spots on lawns

How close wildlife are coming to human populations in search of food and water

Ex: Frequency of deer in yards

Ex: Number of bears looking for food or water

Number of animals or species species at a drinking water source

Ex: Number of birds or species at birdbath or feeder

Presence or absence of aquatic species at a favorite fishing hole; number or size of a certain species; number of species counted

Presence or absence of mosquitoes, grasshoppers, other insects with life-cycles related to dry and wet weather

Agriculture

Irrigated crop progress, appearance

Unirrigated crop progress, appearance

Availability or quality of forage or hay for livestock

Availability of water for livestock

Availability of water for irrigation

Water Supply & Quality

Water supply quality and quantity for human consumption: Need to haul or boil water

Water quality and characteristics: Changes in taste, odor, color, chemical content (if a well is tested regularly)

Municipal supply: Voluntary or mandatory watering restrictions

Availability of water for livestock

Availability of water for irrigation

Recreation & Tourism

Water-based recreation: Number of people boating, canoeing, swimming, fishing at a certain spot

Outdoor recreation: Number of people hiking, camping, etc.

Society & Public Health

Water supply quality and quantity for human consumption: Need to haul or boil water

Air quality related to dust, aerosols, smoke: Whether outdoor activities are accessible or need to be curtailed due to air quality

Mood: How do you or the people around you -- farmers, ranchers, neighbors, family, etc. -- sound when talking about the weather? You could describe the mood in words such as normal, glad, amazed, depressed,
scared, or relieved. Or you could use a scale such as 1 to 10, with 1 being
“very unpleasant” and 10 being “very pleasant.”

Business & Industry

Pounds of bait sold>

Number or quality of fish catch, or the need to diversify species or business activities

Number of watercraft rented (canoes, kayaks, pontoon boats)

Effects on landscaping business, such as number of plants replaced or planted, people employed